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1
Cut the chicken thigh into bite-sized pieces, season with salt and pepper, and leave for a while.
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2
Lightly wash the rice, soak in water for about 15 minutes, and drain in a sieve for about 15 minutes.
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3
Rinse off the syrup from the chestnuts, pat dry, and roast in the toaster oven until they turn light brown on the surface.
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4
Cut off the stem end of the mushrooms.
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5
Pull shimeji or maitake mushrooms apart.
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6
Cut enoki or king oyster mushrooms into thirds, and shred vertically by hand.
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7
Pour olive oil in a Le Creuset pan or paella pan (or frying pan), place the chicken thigh from Step 1 facing the skin side down, and saute over medium heat.
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8
Brown the chicken without moving much.
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9
The chicken will be cooked with the rice later on, so take out from the pan before it's cooked through, and set aside.
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10
Add a little olive oil in the emptied pan, put all of the mushrooms, saute them briefly, and remove from the pan.
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11
In the emptied pan, add the garlic and onion, saute them without scorching, and turn off the heat.
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12
Break up the saffron into small pieces.
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13
Combine the saffron and 1 tablespoon of the 185 ml chicken soup stock, and microwave for 15 seconds to make saffron water.
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14
If you don't have saffron, you can sprinkle with turmeric to make the soup yellow.
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15
Put the rice, saffron water, the remaining chicken soup, and sherry into the pan from Step 8.
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16
Heat over low-medium heat for 7 minutes.
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17
After 7 minutes, add the mushrooms, chicken, and chestnuts on top, cover with a lid, and heat over low-medium heat for a further 6 minutes.
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18
After 6 minutes, open the lid, arrange the red bell pepper, cover with the lid, and heat over high heat for 30 seconds.
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19
Steam with the lid on for 10-15 minutes.
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20
Open the lid, garnish with chopped Italian parsley and thinly sliced lemon.
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21
You can buy a jar of sweet chestnuts in sugar syrup.
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22
As long as you have this at home, you can eat chestnut rice all year round.
